


This is you and me

by hope_calaris



Category: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-10
Updated: 2012-01-10
Packaged: 2017-10-29 07:47:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/317469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hope_calaris/pseuds/hope_calaris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Ethan kisses Brandt. (written for this <a href="http://ghotocol-kink.livejournal.com/1494.html?thread=120022#t120022">prompt</a> on the M:I 4 kink meme)</p>
            </blockquote>





	This is you and me

**Author's Note:**

> Not beta'd. English is still not my first language. I don't believe in anon. Unashamedly inclusion of h/c. Probably a tiny bit more angst than the OP wanted. I regret nothing, though.

_i._

Their first kiss is preceded by gunfire and close calls and a really, really narrow escape. Ethan is fuming. Scratch that. Ethan is shaking with leftover adrenaline and so much fury he could probably take a whole town apart.

“You hesitated!” he yells and shoves Will against a wall. His fingers tremble and his breath comes in short gasp.

“Because it was a dumb idea!” Will yells, but he doesn’t shove back. “And you are not made of Kevlar, Ethan. I could have hit you!”

In Ethan’s mind that’s not really that big of a deal. It probably would have been a through-and-through anyway and really, he had worse. “Better than that asshole shooting you with my gun!” He’s still not done with the screaming, and his fingers have curled around Will’s arms and he doesn’t even remember doing it.

“No,” is what Will says to that, and it’s calm and determined and leaves no room for more discussion or a yelling match. It makes Ethan blink, and he tries to take a deep breath but he sees the fear and the doubt in Will’s eyes. Fear and doubt he put there and still hasn’t erased, but he wants to, oh, so desperately he can actually feel it like a pull on his heart.

“I trust you,” he says, each single word emphasized, and Will’s eyes go wide. “Completely.” And then, because he’s always the one following his intuition, he leans forward and kisses Will with all the fierceness and heat he can muster.

Will doesn’t shove him away.

 _ii._

They pretend to be a couple for a mission, which leads to much hilarity and snickering on Benji’s and Jane’s part and some lewd remarks via com.

“And it’s not like this is even much hardship for you,” Benji complains from where he’s sitting in his van for the millionth time. “It’s like you get all the fun assignments, and I have to listen to an old, very old grandma telling me about her twenty-five cats. How is that fair?”

“Radio silence,” Ethan mutters again and clenches his teeth. He’s this close to just hitting the counter of the bar with his head. This is a low-risk mission, okay, but seriously, they’re supposed to be professionals.

“They’re just jealous, ignore them,” Will says with a grin standing next to him, and then he slips his hand into Ethan’s and it does fuzzy things to Ethan’s stomach. Normally, they hold back with the PDA, but now they’re on a mission.

“Did he just tell Ethan to ignore us? Jane! Do something!” Benji’s voice comes over the com link.

“Naah, I enjoy the show,” Jane replies and Ethan can hear the smile in her voice. “Guys, they’re watching us,” she warns them in the next moment and without losing a beat, Ethan draws Will closer to him.

“I really like this assignment,” he whispers before he kisses him, open-mouthed and with tongue. He doesn’t think Will is going to complain about it.

 _iii._

He presses a gentle kiss on Will’s forehead and doesn’t care that Jane and Benji are in the same room. He hasn’t cared a lot about anything in the past few days. Not about protocol, and what the secretary might think, or how many people he and his team killed to get Will out of the hands of his captors. He knows they’re in trouble because they defied orders to do so, but he couldn’t just leave Will behind. He wouldn’t do that if it were Jane or Benji either, but Will … that’s a different matter, and they all know it.

“He’s going to be okay,” Jane says and squeezes his shoulder. “He just needs a lot of rest, you heard the doctor.”

And yes, he’s heard the doctor and the surgeon and everyone else. He knows that the IV lines he sees attached to Will’s sleeping body don’t mean he’s going to lose him, but he _had_ lost him. For three days. Three endless, sleepless days, which had felt more like three months before they’d found Will again.

Ethan hadn’t really known what to make of this … _thing_ between him and Will until now. It’s been crazy and insane and an endless rush of heat and confusion rolled into one bullet which hit him square in the chest, unable to defend himself. He still doesn’t know how to label it, but he’s sure as hell that he doesn’t want to lose it.

 _iv._

“You need to stop this right now,” Will tells him, his voice waving between real annoyance and affection.

“I -- ” Ethan takes a step back. “I just … ” he trails off because he’s not really sure he wants to voice his feeling, let alone if he even could.

“I get it,” Will says, his voice as gentle as his hand around Ethan’s wrist when he reaches out to him. “Really, I do. But it’s been two months and I’m fine. You know I’m fine.”

“Yes, I know,” Ethan finally concedes. He does know that. He’s seen the scars on Will’s torso fade and the cast on his right wrist getting cut off. Will is fine. As fine as someone in their line of work can be. It just has gotten really hard to compartmentalize when it comes to Will.

“So, can I please go and do my job now? I really don’t want to call the Secretary and tell him I’d be delighted to finally accept his offer to return as Chief Analyst because you’re afraid of letting me out into the field again,” Will says in a teasing tone, and Ethan knows he’s being silly. Thank you very much, he doesn’t need to be mocked for it.

“Just a moment,” Ethan says and cuts Will’s protest off when he frames his face with his hands and kisses him. It’s short and rushed and maybe it has a hint of desperation in it the way their teeth clash, but Ethan feels better afterwards. “I have your back,” he whispers against Will’s cheek when they part.

“I know.”

 _v._

Ethan thinks he likes these kisses the best. They are in bed and there’s no mission for which they have to risk their lives, and no Benji to shatter endlessly and ignoring their radio silence. It’s just them and the silence of a dawning morning, and it doesn’t matter that both their breaths smell of coffee. Their kisses are lavish and unhurried, and Will makes content noises in the back of his throat, still half-asleep. He’s not a morning person when he doesn’t have to be. Ethan likes that about him, likes that he can go for a run and come back with coffee which they drink together in bed after he’s showered, likes that Will finally doesn’t feel the need to shadow him on his run anymore because he can’t forget Croatia, likes that Will trusts them both enough to not let it trouble his sleep.

They’ve come a long way.

 

 _\- fin_


End file.
